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The Flaming Lotus Girls BBQ Shindig

World-renowned fire art sculpture mavens the Flaming Lotus Girls are pleased to announce an afternoon & evening of art, music, and fun to unveil the design for their newest piece,  Tympani Lambada! Come heat up the summer with the Flaming Lotus Girls, SATURDAY JUNE 4^th,  at The Box Shop, 951 Hudson Avenue, SF, 3:00 pm — 10:00 pm.

Check out where the Flaming Lotus Girls work, play and make hot metal magic come to life! See the latest plans for FLG’s grand new sculpture,  Tympani Lambada, headed out to Burning Man 2011.

The women and men who brought you  Serpent Mother, Mutopia, Soma, and many other breathtaking works warmly invite you to join them for a BBQ Shindig to help us complete our grandest sculpture yet. Every donation supports the creation of stunning fire art and helps this female-driven group continue their tradition of innovation and inclusiveness.

Enjoy tasty sizzling bites from Catherine and Rosa Anna, DJs Smoove (NewsBreakz) and others, and, of course, some fire art!

Best of all — the evening is open to one and all, with no cover charge! Yes, that’s right. It’s absolutely FREE, and we want YOU to come.

Hang with the artists, pick up some classic FLG schwag, treat yourself to some savory food and dance the night away to some of the Bay Area’s preeminent DJs. You’ll have a fabulous time with the pleasure of knowing you’re supporting unique and extraordinary art.

The Flaming Lotus Girls BBQ Shindig
Saturday, June 4, 2011

3:00 pm to 10:00 pm

The Box Shop, 951 Hudson Avenue in San Francisco

Free to attend (donations encouraged)

More information:  www.flaminglotus.com

BBQ Magic by FLGs Catherine & Rosa Anna

Sonic backdrop by:

DJ Smoove (NewsBreakz), and others

Show your support for local artists! Your generosity will help us raise essential funds required to see this monumental work come to fruition.

With love and lipstick kisses,

Flaming Lotus Girls

http://www.flaminglotus.com

Here is video part 2 of 4 showing Reuben Margolin’s Nebula.

Wherein there is much talk of how to actually ship and put together 12 tons of kinetic art. Having built big art, I can say that this is a very real depiction of what goes on.

Reuben Margolin’s Nebula video – part 2

Go back and see part 1.

Here’s one more photo for the journal. This is from last night’s Electronic Controlled Flame Effects class. That’s my hand holding the cutest little double-poofer you ever did see. This was terrific proof to the students that a 1lb cylinder produces just as powerful a poof as a larger one, just not for as many times before freezing up and/or running out of gas.

It made a fireball that by gum nearly touched the 30 foot high ceiling! It would be more accurate to call it a fire “jet” owing to the 1/8″ nozzle on the pipes.

Flame effects at work

Please note that the man’s head obscured by the fireball was not, in fact blown off by the force of the blast.

Here’s some photos from recent travels. Click to enlarge! Better yet, mouseover each image briefly to preload, then click when you want to view.

Creative forklifting at NIMBY. Not sketchy at all.

Brunch in Alameda. Quite a nice spread!

Charlotte brings my touchstone, Joe's O's in her new measlecar

Look at the name of the school. Just look at it! Yes, this is a real school in Alameda.

Erika straps in to receive an automated randomized religion reassignment tattoo at the amazing ArtPadSF event at the Phoenix Hotel

Tada! Now she's a Jew!

Building a new poofer at Center Hardware!

Building the poofer in Electronic Controlled Flame Effects class!

An aerial performance at the NIMBY BBQ!

I've got a bad cold. Aunt Dorothy's caps will help make me better!

A couple weeks ago I went to Paolo Salvagione’s closing event of his “Competitive Swinging”. It was great fun*. A reporter for the San Francisco Chronicle, Sarah Adler was there and interviewed me :-)

View the full article here

Here are bits of the article archived locally

Sarah Adler took some nice photos of us on the swings. Thanks Sarah!

Former artist-in-residence at the Headlands Center for the Arts, conceptual artist and sculptor Paolo Salvagione was invited back in April to activate the gymnasium space. Calling it “Competitive Swinging,” he created a sculpture for the old military barrack by utilizing the existing ceiling hardware once used to hang climbing rope for military exercises. He combined that with the basketball court’s geometric grid to hang and linearly place 10 swings (five on each side).

Recalling the squeaky swing set of his childhood, Salvagione designed the swings to avoid any audible reference; rather, participants swing in silence, feeling the breeze off the Marin Headlands.

On the last day of its installation, folks gathered to swing as pendulums and relive the playfulness of their own childhood swing sets.

– Sarah Adler, sadler@sfchronicle.com

…

David Calkins, 43

Profession: Robot builder

Neighborhood: Mill Valley

When was the last time you were on a swing?

A few weeks ago because Emma (his 2 1/2-year-old daughter with him at the gymnasium) loves to play on the swings.

What is your first swinging memory?

In the park by my grandma’s house growing up. There was a set of swings with big tall metal posts – you could get really high up.

How do you feel when you are swinging on a swing?

You get that almost flying sensation. But it’s hard if you don’t swing on a regular basis; you’re surprised by how many muscles you don’t normally use.

Other favorite piece of playground equipment?

My favorite is whatever Emma’s favorite is. Right now, she likes big slides. (Danger is her middle name.)

Lee Sonko, 41

Profession: Teacher and artist

Neighborhood: Mission

When was the last time you were on a swing?

Three or four years ago in the middle of the night. Before that it was 25 years.

What is your first swinging memory?

In my West Milford, N.J., elementary school playground. We had a giant swing set.

How do you feel when you are swinging on a swing?

A little dizzy. A lot free. A little in control. A little out of control. Ridiculously silly.

Other favorite piece of playground equipment?

There was this spinning table thing; sort of a merry-go-round. It was a 4-foot circular table that you spun around and it always felt really dangerous to be on that because you’d spin so fast and then fly off into the mulch.

————————————————–

*except for the great/crashed OKCupid date, but I digress

And I have to say thank you to to Simone Davalos of Suicidebots et all for posting the event to Squidlist. It was just my kind of event :-). Paolo and Jennifer are terrific.

It’s official, La Lengua is a neighborhood in San Francisco.
The full story

Google Maps link

There are no limits to what you can accomplish when you are supposed to be doing something else.

– Words to live by – stolen from Someecards.com when I should have been working on something else.

Here’s my current go-to list of finding fun activities in the Bay Area.

• Squidlist
• SF FunCheap
• ZVents
• BACDS — The Bay Area Country Dance Society Website
• The Starry Plough Pub and Nightclub
• Events | Books Inc. – The West’s Oldest Independent Bookseller
• Events | Viracocha SF
• San Francisco Bay Guardian
• SOMArts – Calendar
• HappyCortex – Event Listings – Home
• Ashkenaz Music & Dance Community Center
• SFGate Entertainment

Bay Area Lost Horizon Night Market April 30, 2011. On a deserted street in Oakland.

Bay Area Lost Horizon Night Market. This truck had padding on the walls. A person would enter with protective gear and a big hammer. They'd have some time to smash all the objects in the truck as hard as they could. Awesome.

Billy Hiebert at the Crucible's Fireside Lounge

Billy Heibert smashed this amazing ceramic sphere he built in 1983 on stage. There was a moment when the hot hammer was going through the ceramic, and it had shattered into a hundred pieces but it was still roughly in the same shape. I could see bits of the wall behind it in slivers. It looked a lot like a water balloon that had just been popped, a tumultuous ball of water that had just forgotten what shape it was supposed to be. One moment it existed. The next, it didn’t. Wow.

Crucible Hot Hammer

And when I say “hot hammer”, I mean it! On stage, they poured bronze into a sand mold and made a hammer before our eyes! I was really surprised how fast the metal of the head cooled. They first pulled it after maybe 45 seconds but the bronze was slushy and only some of the hammer was formed. They smooshed it it back in and pulled out a red hot hammer after another 30 seconds. They handed it to Billy and he smashed the sphere!

Flower at Civic Center

I was walking up Market St last week and came across this giant flower near Civic Center.

Modern Times Bookstore moving

Walking home last Monday night, May 2nd, I watched as the Modern Times Bookstore closed it’s doors for the last time at it’s current location. I overheard phrases like, “I can’t believe this is it.” The vacancy rate of storefronts in my neighborhood always scares me. Modern Times is reopening on 24th St in a month so says their website.

The Mysterious Valencia Periscope

On my same walk home, I ran into an intriguing periscope-like contraption dangling from an apartment! Here is some great other coverage of the house on MissionMission, and. :-)

Competitive Swinging! That is Jen and I swinging.

On Sunday I went to the Headlands Center for the Arts with a better friend to see Paolo Salvagione’s “Competitive Swinging“. A set of totally grownup swings. It was cool. His girl Jen showed me Paolo’s art catalog from the Headlands Center, he has a bunch of pretty awesome pieces! From a Magic 8 Ball that always says “Yes”, to hopscotch that makes you light as a feather, brush bristle shoes, an eclipse machine, a crazy spinning mirror/window… I’m recalling these from memory because they all stuck with me!

Bowling at the Headlands Center for the Arts. Oo, gutter ball!

Did you know there is a bowling alley in the basement of the gymnasium of the Headlands Center for the Arts? Rumor has it that it has the oldest mechanically set pin machine west of the Mississippi. I took this photo from the position behind the pins because that’s where you stand as the pin setter. Groovy.